Recipe: Perfect Hopping John

Hopping John. Traditionally, Hoppin' John is a one-pot recipe, but that often produces soupy results. Instead, cook the black-eyed peas with aromatics and broth until tender; then strain and reserve the liquid for later. In a large pan place the peas, ham hock, onion, red pepper, salt and pepper.

At its core, however, Hoppin' John is rice, black-eyed peas (or field peas), smoked pork, and onions. Hoppin' John, also known as Carolina peas and rice, is a peas and rice dish served in the Southern United States. It is made with black-eyed peas (or red cowpeas such as iron and clay peas in the Southeast US) and rice, chopped onion, and sliced bacon, seasoned with salt. You can cook Hopping John using 8 ingredients and 4 steps. Here is how you achieve it.

Ingredients of Hopping John

1. Prepare 1 pound of dried black-eyed peas.
2. You need 1 of small smoked ham hock (about 1/2 pound).
3. Prepare 2 of bay leaves.
4. You need 2 cloves of garlic, smashed and peeled 10 cups water.
5. You need 1/2 pound of spicy chorizo sausage or spicy Italian sausage.
6. Prepare 1 cup of rice.
7. It's 1 teaspoon of salt.
8. Prepare 1 cup of sliced scallions (6 to 7).

Some recipes use ham hock, fatback, country sausage, or smoked turkey parts instead of bacon. Hoppin' John is a basic, simple black-eyed pea stew. I kept it extremely pared down, and when I made it yesterday I had a hard time not adding bright red bell pepper, big pieces of torn kale, and canned diced tomatoes. All of these are acceptable, of course, but I wanted to keep it basic and unadorned.

Hopping John instructions

1. Soak the black-eyed peas overnight in water to cover by 2 inches. Drain well..
2. In a large pot, combine the drained black-eyed peas, ham hock, bay leaves, garlic and water. Bring to a boil, reduce to a high simmer, partially cover and cook until the peas are almost tender, about 45 minutes..
3. Meanwhile, remove the casings from the chorizo or prick the sausage in several places with the tines of a fork. Fill a medium skillet with about 1/8 inch of water. Add the sausages and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Cook the sausages until cooked through, about 10 minutes. Set them aside and discard the cooking juices. When cool enough to handle, cut the sausages into 1/2 inch dice..
4. Add the sausage, rice and salt to the pot, recover and cook until the rice is tender, about 20 minutes. Stir in the scallions and bell pepper about 10 minutes before the rice is done. If desired, pull off any meat from the ham hocks and add to the pot. Discard the bay leaves..

Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat. I made this recipe of Hoppin John this year. Apparently so does my step daughter and son-in-law. They also took some home with them! I'm going to try it again with the dried.